Category: News

Lenovo Channel EMEA Vice President makes his 2024 predictions

Posted on December 18, 2023 by - News

Lenovo Channel EMEA Vice President Ralf Jordan has been looking ahead to 2024 and sees the cloud changing the face of corporate reselling.

Jordan said that hybrid and multi-cloud are the twin engines that are driving the modernisation of IT across every sector, including a disruption of the channel landscape.

“In 2023, the work of a traditional corporate reseller that buys, enhances and sells products still exists but alongside new, evolving ways to work. Cloud service providers are increasingly taking over some of the capacity, as business requirements that historically were done in a data centre are moving to the cloud,” he said.

Jordan said that customers enjoy the benefits of cloud infrastructure but realise that adopting a one-size-fits-all approach carries risks, including the possibility that more agile competitors might leave them behind.

“There is no doubt that the multi-cloud trend will continue, moving from the large enterprise market where it began into the small and medium business space,” he said.

Illumio turns the Ignition.

Posted on December 15, 2023 by - News

Security outfit Illumio is announcing its first UK and Ireland distribution deal with Ignition.

The US-based vendor has seen growth in UK&I in the last few years and wants to double its regional investment.

Illumio VP Adrian Crawley said his company had a channel-first vendor strategy, especially in the UK and Ireland.

“In the current complex hybrid environment, many organisations have focused on replacing VPNs and figuring out the identity to connect people. However, they are realising they also need to contain potential breaches and ransomware attacks, which continue to rise despite security investments,” Crawley said.

UK about to face a catastrophic ransomware attack

Posted on December 15, 2023 by - News

Hacker typing on a laptop

The Joint Committee on National Security Strategy (JCNSS) has warned that the UK is “A hostage to fortune: ransomware and UK national security.”

The report into the UK readiness for a cyber-attack on critical national infrastructure says the Home Office have no significant plans for a bad ransomware attack which the JCNSS considers the UK to be at high risk.

The report warns that such an attack would likely cause “severe disruption” to the delivery of core government services, including healthcare and child protection. It has the potential to “bring the country to a standstill.”

It points out that there have been numerous cybersecurity compromises in the public realm of late, including on several police forces and St Helens council.

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) describes critical national infrastructure (CNI) as national assets essential for society’s functioning, including energy supply, water supply, transportation, health and telecommunications.

UK is not ready to legislate on AI yet

Posted on December 14, 2023 by - News

Digital secretary Michelle Donelan says UK government will not legislate on artificial intelligence (AI) but wants to develop a “pro-innovation” framework.

Donelan appeared before the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee to answer MPs’ questions about the UK’s current approach to fostering and regulating the development of AI.

The committee published an interim report on the UK’s developing AI governance arrangements at the end of August, which warned there is a danger the UK will be “left behind” by legislation being developed elsewhere, specifically the European Union’s (EU) AI Act.

The report identified 12 challenge areas for AI legislation related to various competition, accountability and social issues associated with AI’s operation, including bias, privacy, misrepresentation, data access, computing power, and open source.

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CMA and Unilever row might send a warning to greenwashers

Posted on December 14, 2023 by - News

Nearly every company claims to be sustainable and environmentally friendly, but regulators are getting snarky when companies overegg the pudding.

Unilever, the multinational consumer goods company behind well-known brands like Dove soap and Hellmann’s mayonnaise, is under investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) over allegations that it may be exaggerating the environmental friendliness of some of its products.

The CMA said it is cracking down on companies suspected of engaging in “corporate greenwashing” as customers want to make more sustainable choices.

The CMA’s primary concern is that Unilever may be misleading consumers with vague and broad statements regarding the environmental attributes of products. The watchdog points to the use of language and imagery on packaging that could potentially overstate the eco-friendliness of these products.

Surprise management moves at RingCentral

Posted on December 13, 2023 by - News

The founder and former CEO of RingCentral, Vlad Shmunis, is returning to the company following the surprising exit of Tarek Robbiati.

RingCentral had announced that Tarek Robbiati would become the new chief in August 2023.

In a statement, the company said that Robbiati’s resignation was not due to any disagreement with the company or the Board of Directors or any matter related to the company’s operations, policies or practices.

Rob Theis, RingCentral’s lead independent director, said: “RingCentral’s strategic product vision and operations are closely aligned and linked. We have concluded that it is best to have one executive oversee all aspects of the business organisation.

Rackspace releases new product for partners

Posted on December 13, 2023 by - News

Cloudy Rackspace has launched its SDDC (Software Defined Data Centre) Enterprise and Business for SAP with VMware virtualised computing, storage, network, and cloud management products for its channel partners.

The multi-tenant VMware solutions enable business-critical SAP and SAP HANA (High-Performance Analytic Appliance) environments with a fully integrated hardware and software stack for private clouds. The enterprise-ready grade solution and SAP-certified pre-configuration based on Dell VxRail is a turnkey experience that enables innovation.

Arrow improves cloud management platform.

Posted on December 12, 2023 by - News

Arrow Electronics has added functionality to its cloud management platform to support more everything-as-a-service (XaaS) options.

Extra services include more hybrid and multi-load monitoring options under the bonnet of its ArrowSphere platform.

The company said that its partners are increasingly offering multi-cloud support to customers to ensure they can meet the demands of users operating across various flavours of public and private cloud.

Arrow added updates that focus on sustainability, cost optimisation and security. Adding the GreenOps, FinOps, and SecOps dashboards allows partners to increase the visibility of key areas of concern for customers.

TD SYNNEX trains partners on net zero

Posted on December 12, 2023 by - News

TD SYNNEX has opened its Net Zero Academy, a three-day course to train partners on assessing their carbon impact and creating a plan to move their business towards net zero.

The first two days are classroom-based at TD SYNNEX’s offices in Basingstoke and a further day of home or office-based learning and assessment.

The course has been accredited by the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA) and delivered by specialist consultancy Arete Zero Carbon.

TD SYNNEX business unit director Sophia Haywood-Atkinson said sustainability commitments recognised by industry standards have become “increasingly important” as customers are looking much harder at the commitment of their suppliers.

Ekco snaps up Bluecube

Posted on December 11, 2023 by - News

Irish Ekco has acquired UK cybersecurity firm Bluecube and effectively doubled its UK presence.

This is Ekco’s fourth acquisition in the last year and augments Ekco’s service portfolio for UK clients with security offerings and improved critical recovery abilities, strengthening Ekco’s incident response capacities amid rising threats.

This acquisition aligns with Ekco’s global expansion strategy, which it says is fuelled by organic growth and European acquisitions, and new US offices.

Chillblast product manager jailed for stealing hardware

Posted on December 11, 2023 by - News

A UK-based System Integrator Chillblast product manager stole nearly £200,000 worth of PC hardware over several years and then flogged it on Gumtree and eBay.

Matthew Hudson (pictured) and his chum Daniel Key sold up to thirty laptops, ten desktop systems, 50 graphics cards, and shedloads of storage drives and monitors.

Prosecutor Tom Nicholson told Bournemouth Crown Court how Hudson exploited the trust of his colleagues due to his position and access to inventory checklists and customer returns. He has been doing it from 2013 until 2019. Daniel Key helped Hudson sell these stolen goods and split the profits from their sales.

Hudson was good at hiding his tracks on paper by manipulating stock levels, stealing items from custom returns, and making new items in the inventory unavailable by showing items as returned and credited.

Zoom and Five9 have another stab at acquisition

Posted on December 7, 2023 by - News

Zoom is having another stab at buying Five9 more than two years after its failed $14.7 billion bid.

According to a Bloomberg report, Zoom, the California-based communications tool vendor, has held acquisition discussions with Five9, which is working with advisers.

Five9, a contact centre software vendor based in California, will likely attract other potential buyers.

Five9 has about 950 channel partners worldwide and 700 in North America. More than 32 per cent of Zoom’s overall sales come through the channel. In 2022, the company said it had over 8,500 partners worldwide.

In 2021, Zoom’s $14.7bn offer for Five9 was voted down by the its shareholders.

 

Microsoft wants to build UK AI infrastructure

Posted on December 7, 2023 by - News

Microsoft campusMicrosoft has promised to spend $3.2 billion (£2.5 billion) in a bid to create a large AI infrastructure in the UK.

Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith said the plan was to create “a major AI infrastructure and skilling investment supported by a new partnership on security” in the UK.

Vole plans to support AI’s growth and progress without compromising public security. The company’s goal also includes helping the economy and providing jobs.

In line with this, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak recently announced GBP29.5 billion of private funding for new UK projects that would create 12,000 jobs in various sectors including tech, life sciences, renewables, housing and infrastructure.

Global semiconductor revenue growing

Posted on December 6, 2023 by - News

According to Gartner bean counters, global semiconductor revenue is projected to grow 16.8 per cent in 2024 to total $624 billion.

This figure is much better than this year, where the market is forecasted to decline 10.9 per cent and reach $534 billion.

Big G analyst Alan Priestly said: “We are at the end of 2023, and strong demand for chips to support AI workloads, such as GPUs, is not going to be enough to save the semiconductor industry from double-digit decline in 2023.”

“Reduced demand from smartphones and PC customers coupled with weakness in datacentre/hyperscaler spending is influencing the decline in revenue this year.”

However, 2024 is forecast to be a bounce-back year where revenue for all chip types will grow, driven by double-digit growth in the memory market.

The worldwide memory market is forecast to record a 38.8 per cent decline in 2023 and will rebound in 2024 by growing 66.3 per cent, Priestly said.

Blancco has sold itself and is off the share market

Posted on December 6, 2023 by - News

Private equity firm, Francisco Partners has completed the all-cash acquisition of Blancco for representing an equity valuation of £175 million and taken the company off the share market.

For those not in the know, Blancco provides products for organisations to protect end-of-life data against unauthorised access, safely redeploy data storage assets, and comply with increased data protection and privacy requirements.

Blancco CEO Matt Jones said that since its founding 26 years ago, it has created and delivered innovative solutions, focusing on building a world-class data eraser and diagnostic software platform.

“We are pleased to partner with Francisco Partners, who are committed to continuing to build upon the company’s strong foundation and achieve its full potential. I want to thank each employee for their dedication to Blancco and contributing to our continued success,” he said.